What's that thing called when you break up with someone, both see other people and then decide you are going to get back together and have to pretend like the last 6 months never happened? Yeah. It's time for about 1000cc of that.

BACK FROM THE ICE

We went ice fishing today of all things. This is the level that the 2012-13 Lockout has reduced us all to. Trying to find other things to do while we waited for the stewards of our beloved NHL to wrap up ruining the game we love and charitably decide to get back to making billions and millions of dollars respectively.

While we sat in this little shack waiting for a fish to grace us with its slimy presence we were completely unplugged from twitter, internets, cell phonery and everything to do with communication.

You would have had to send a telegram to the local general store and had the pony express clip clop it out onto the ice to get us any news. In this most remote of locales the NHL lockout ended and we wouldn't know until about 3 PM MST.

The conversation with our fellow temporary fishermen centred on the obvious: the lockout and how we would all respond when it inevitably ended. Some of the boys were understandably frustrated with how long things have dragged on, the complete indifference from both sides to all us fans and swore that they would penalize the NHL one way or other when it finally got it's act together.

We will now write an article version of what we ranted at the top of our lungs. Oh and maybe a Lil Wayne video for some music.

NO LOVE

Often times life can be a grind of day jobs, car repairs, jackass bosses and costly ear medicine bills mounting to the sky. Some of us may even have more serious issues to deal with - money problems, health scares, problems with the wife, dramas of so many sorts. The NHL provides an excellent distraction from all of this and has done so for many many years.

As an elementary school kid we used to shovel most of the neighbourhood's snow to afford season tickets to the Mighty Oil. Undoubtedly the youngest self paid ticket holder in the history of the club, we would go to games with our near totally blind Grandma on the bus and would sit up high in the seats of Rexall Place and cheer on some of the worst clubs in Oilers history.

Grandma Wanye listening with massive headphones on her portable radio and Young Wanye screaming and yelling a non-stop barrage of insults (the 2012 version can be read @wanyegretz) We would then make our way home and listen to the post game show until the angels carried us off to slumber. We missed probably 3 games in 5 years until high school and the prospect of University forced us to save our hard earned dough for other things.

These long seasons of losses piled to the sky in front of a half filled building with our Grandma forged us into an Oiler fan made of steel for all eternity. When we see King Jordan of Eberle super snipe a goal, the Nuge dingle dangle around 12 people or Devan Dubnyk muff an easy save we are brought back to those golden days and often smile thinking about how our now departed Grandma would be beside herself with excitement for this new team.

HERE'S THE THING

Why we are all super hockey fans - and make no mistake the Nation Network is the biggest of its kind on Earth so there are more of us here than anywhere else - has nothing to do with the Gary Bettman's and Donald Fehr's of the world. It has nothing to do with CBAs, economics, HRR or any of the other brown bananas we have been forced to watch and read about these past several months.

Our reasons for loving our particular team, particular players and why many of us will welcome hockey back with open arms is a personal tale and no two are the same. Make no mistake - we could give two shits about either side involved in this amazingly embarassing lockout. Both parties are riddled with the cancer of self entitlement who take us as fans completely for granted.

They have done irreversable damage to the business in many already shaky markets and it will take years to rebuild their fan basesif it can even be saved at all. Serves them right the bunch of jerks.

But we don't care.

THEY AREN'T HOCKEY

As superfans we cheer for something bigger than all of the nonsense provided by the NHL. These people are merely employees of the game we love - not the game we love and that is an important distinction.

The most important thing for me is preserving the happiness, excitement and pure joy of watching the Oilers win/lose/tie that they have provided my entire life. Other sports don't do it. Other teams don't do it. Watching A&E marathons of Here Comes Honey Boo Boo or whatever other BS we have all busied ourselves with during the lockout doesn't do it either.

If that flame ever goes out a massive part of our life will be lost forever. It's far more important that ignore the clowns in the NHL/NHLPA and preserve that happiness that transports us back to being a kid because being happy is a choice not a right.

And so we choose to welcome back the NHL with open arms. Not because we agree with either side or because they appreciate all our attention, money and worship as fans. They are merely the tenants in the house we all love so much not the house itself. We will go back because we love the game.

It's the reason we started these sites, spent a ton subsidizing losses throughout this stupid lockout and will lead the team to bring them back stronger than ever with all of the supremely talented folk that write here and who can't wait to get back at it.

So protest if you want. We completely understand. But we are going back to business as usual.

HEY CALGARY

Game on bitches.

Blog so hard motherf**ckers try and find me.
Tweet me @wanyegretz provided it is about Jordan Eberle or babes. Find me on instagram for photos of donairs.

Yes Calgary fans, it has sucked to be an Oilers fan for some time, but its going to suck equally as much to be a Calgary fan for the next five years or so and its going to quite fun to be an Oilers fan.

Just look at Jay Feaster and tell me THAT is the guy you are putting your hope in. He makes Tambellini look like James Bond.

Maybe Calgary will decide to do a total rebuild and sink the team for a few years, its too bad that the lottery is far less advantages for lowly ranked teams now. Maybe Mark Jankowski will be your next superstar, he is tearing up the college ranks with four goals in fourteen games.

You might want to just disconnect and pretend that the lockout lasted 5-10 years and then start paying attention again.

Thanks Wanye. All this long and painful lockout HRR term limit decertification podium dregerface bs made me forget for a while. Ok maybe dregerface was mildly entertaining. But not like the love of screaming at my tv and jumping off my couch when Ebs does his sweet toedrag forehand to backhand shelf magic. I can't wait.

Thanks Edmonton for tanking all these years and bringing about the new lottery for draft picks.The majority of the owners obviously and rightfully came to the conclusion that your style of rebuild was not so much about sport ,and more about business.It will probably be reffered to as the Oiler rule.When you do start winning,it will not garner the respect in spite of your obvious skill

You just named all your first round picks plus a guy who jumped ship.You got all those players by being the worst team around .Your point is weak

Let's pretend you find yourself in a bar seeking to drown your sorrows due to the loss of your pet budgie which you accidentally killed by overheating a non-stick frying pan (birds die from this - really) and in walks Charlize Theron who starts crying on your shoulder because her and her boyfriend just broke up. Do you:

a. Forget about her and focus on mourning your budgie,

b. Focus on what a jerk her former boyfriend must be, or

c. Forget about the past and start strategizing for the future and turn to Charlize and say "I know how you feel, I just lost my best friend Stevie to a tragic chemical poisoning incident"?

I can tell you this, I don't care how many budgies the Oilers had to kill to get Eberle, Hall, Yakupov, RNH, and Shultz - its gametime and time to score!

Thanks Edmonton for tanking all these years and bringing about the new lottery for draft picks.The majority of the owners obviously and rightfully came to the conclusion that your style of rebuild was not so much about sport ,and more about business.It will probably be reffered to as the Oiler rule.When you do start winning,it will not garner the respect in spite of your obvious skill

These holier than thou posts by Flamers are going to be especially hilarious when the Flames are wallowing in the gutter.

Thanks Edmonton for tanking all these years and bringing about the new lottery for draft picks.The majority of the owners obviously and rightfully came to the conclusion that your style of rebuild was not so much about sport ,and more about business.It will probably be reffered to as the Oiler rule.When you do start winning,it will not garner the respect in spite of your obvious skill

Awesome, I never really thought about how the Oilers were instrumental in changing the rules to remove the incentive to tank.

I look forward to the 'Calgary Rule' which may read as follows "No GM can sign more than one or two highly suspect players with minimal competitive years left to long term contacts with No Movement Clauses or No Trade Clauses in a manner which would preclude the team from being competitive for upwards of a decade such that it would create delusional fans who misconstrue this inept management with moral superiority" or something like that.

So the CBA is a done deal. Hard to sympathize with either side in this NHLPA vs NHL nonsense. With all the start and stop of these silly negociations over the last 100 or so days, these parties fighting over the fan's money, hard to side with either side. How can the players be fighting for prospective pensions.......PENSIONS with what these guys make in their career (avg salary is $2 million a year) this make whole provision for the lost season....really? Where is the make whole provision for the folks that work in the areans, bars, etc that depend on the NHL games to support themselves? Greed and stupidity and arrogance.
To show the fans frustration with the owners, the players, here is what I suggest. Let's use social media, twitter, facebook, etc, and as a show of support for the game, and to mourn the loss of the season to date, when we go to NHL games (and we will because we love this game and some season is better than no season) wear a black arm band to games this season as a sign of protest to the league and the players for this nonsense lockout.

Come on, Oiler fans, I know you all huddle around Oodle Noodle thinking of ways you can make Calgarians cry while we're all off in our condos in Phoenix.

I would have thought with this much added time, you all would have read like two or three books, did some critical thinking, and maybe come up with something new ;)

And I know you've all got the 5 Cups to Calgary's 1 in your back pocket, and you're just itching to use that, but that's all like...well Christ man, this all happened before we were using NETSCAPE to connect to the internet on our 28.8k modems. I don't even know what half the words I just used in this paragraph are!

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go party with Peter Pocklington and Harvey the Hound's tongue, which if you do the math is your precious little team's only lasting legacies.

Peace be with you, go Flames go, and we'll see you on whatever the hell date it is Round 1 of the BoA is.

Listen here Coiler fans from Deadmonton. The Oilers cannot make the playoffs with simply Eberle, Hall, Nugent-Hopkins,Yakupov, and Schultz.

They need a goalie, Dubnyk was solid at the Spengler Cup but can he win consistently? Which Khabibulin will show up?

The veteran guys need to carry some of the load. We know Ryan Smyth bleeds Oiler blue. The same cannot be said for the softy Hemsky and the underachieving captain Shawn Horcoff.

There were a lot of nights when the young kids weren't going, the entire team wasn't going.

Its called "being along for the ride" and hey, its far more fun to watch the kids score 7 and give up 4 than score 1 and play the trap/rely on an ageing goaltender to win them the game (lookin at you Kipprusoft)

If we can't make the playoffs with the aforementioned, I'd hate to be in your position, thinking about the Flames chances and all...

I said some things I didn't mean during this lockout, but because they at LEAST salvaged a half season I can forgive to a certain extent. I am pumped the season is back on, but more excited to see all our young lil rascals back in Oiler silks. I'll be somewhat bitter and cynical for the rest of the season, but I'll heal.

I do wonder about the southern markets though. Hopefully it means more teams in Canada one day.

That's horrible. Are you the type of person that sees a moaning cat that was half run over by a car dying in the hot sun and you laugh at it? That's pretty much what you just did there.

Com'n look at these Calgary fans. You can just see the hopelessness in their eyes as they prattle on about their team. The hopeless ones aren't the ones I feel the most pity for though, its the more indoctrinated ones who still think Iginla and Kiprisoff are franchise players who are going to have a big year, and that Feaster was smarter than the rest of the league with his 'genius' draft picks the last few years. Those are the ones who are going to have that terrible crash of emotions when they come to realize the truth.

Now apologise, and give some Calgary fan a hug and tell them It'll be alright. It's not going to be alright, but at least maybe you can get out of there before they collapse in a wretched pile of wailing despair.

That's horrible. Are you the type of person that sees a moaning cat that was half run over by a car dying in the hot sun and you laugh at it? That's pretty much what you just did there.

Com'n look at these Calgary fans. You can just see the hopelessness in their eyes as they prattle on about their team. The hopeless ones aren't the ones I feel the most pity for though, its the more indoctrinated ones who still think Iginla and Kiprisoff are franchise players who are going to have a big year, and that Feaster was smarter than the rest of the league with his 'genius' draft picks the last few years. Those are the ones who are going to have that terrible crash of emotions when they come to realize the truth.

Now apologise, and give some Calgary fan a hug and tell them It'll be alright. It's not going to be alright, but at least maybe you can get out of there before they collapse in a wretched pile of wailing despair.

I recognize the empty look in their beady eyes. For reference please see my eyes 2006-2011 and especially the year I picked Erik Cole as my star.